One By One
by Alley Cat Sunflower
Summary: Blake has been thinking about leaving the White Fang for awhile, and today's train robbery might be her last mission. It isn't where her loyalties lie that will push her one way or another, though… it's where Adam chooses to put his faith that sways her. This oneshot follows the Black trailer and its effects on the future stray. T for reasons. I do not own RWBY!


_**Your hopes have become my burden. I will find my own liberation…**_

The sun is just beginning to rise, painting the sky a pale coral hue, and the broken moon looks down at Blake coldly as she contemplates her conflicting duties—to herself and to the White Fang. This may well be her last mission: she wants to savor the calm before the storm for as long as possible, thinking of all she has to lose and all she might gain by leaving.

_**Blake. It's time.**_

Adam's words are oddly gentle as he steps forward, though his face—as usual, hidden beneath his mask—is just as impassive as hers. At his quiet reminder, her heartbeat quickens momentarily before she forces it to slow again. Her decision is not yet final, after all. _He_ has the ability to sway her one way or another in a tango of ideals, and though she is well aware of the potential consequences for staying in such a cutthroat organization, the prospects of leaving the only friend she has are… daunting, to say the least.

_**Okay.**_

A simple word of acknowledgment leaves her mouth as she opens her eyes, and she knows it isn't as emotionless as she tries to make it. Blake's apprehension at her imminent decision can't be concealed, but Adam only nods (after an uncharacteristic hesitation) and takes off running towards the nearby cliff, with no warning and no backwards glance. Blake jumps down from the boulder and sprints behind him, remembering bygone races with a small smile at his back; ever since learning that she's actually just as fast as him, he has endeavored to give himself a head start whenever possible, be it in training or on a mission—probably because he's something of a sore loser.

_**Looks like we're going to be doing this the hard way.**_

The words are spoken with fierce determination, and perhaps a little eagerness, as Blake lands in the first car (the lock on the trapdoor having been broken, courtesy of Wilt): two rows of fortunately dormant robots are about to awaken. Drawing from Blake's considerable knowledge of Adam and his personality, he's probably known all along that going this way would lead to a fight. He just hasn't bothered to readjust his course, since he loves fighting so much—and he has enough faith in Blake to trust that she'll survive whatever traps he drags her through, accidentally or otherwise.

In a way, Blake _likes_ his obstinacy. It's anything but helpful in situations like this, but it's at least a certainty in this ever-changing life of hers. His presence, even the stubbornness that comes with it, is constant and strangely reassuring. Of course, she'll only admit it when she's not in the middle of one of the many problems it causes.

_**Don't be so dramatic.**_

A rush of adrenaline prompts a smile as she prepares Gambol Shroud for battle, worries momentarily melting away, to be replaced by relief. Most of her apprehension regarding the heist involved whether or not she would be required to kill humans again. In fact, Blake's internal debate about where her loyalty lies began the first time she was asked to take human lives. She accepted her mission reluctantly—out of fear of punishment should she refuse—but left the killing to Adam instead. Now that robots are their only adversaries (for now, anyway), she can join him in the fray with no inhibitions.

_**Intruder. Identify yourself.**_

As Adam and Blake stand back to back, keeping an eye on the enemies surrounding them, the robots' apparent leader speaks up. Adam shifts and straightens up, facing the machine with his head held high, mask ensuring that the question never be answered. And, as usual—Blake shivers in anticipation—his mouth displays only the slightest of arrogant smiles as he calmly pulls Blush's trigger.

_**Let's do this!**_

Not having been challenged much by a carful of incompetent robots (compared to two experienced Faunus, that is), Blake follows Adam back onto the roof to find more awaiting them. Her partner's traditional rallying cry is accompanied by a glance at her; she wishes she could see his eyes. If eyes are the windows to the soul, then Adam Taurus is soulless, and Blake knows it: were these humans, he would gut them just as decisively. She swallows dryly as she sails into battle, refusing to allow her newfound misgivings—fear that he'll turn on her if she leaves him—to cloud her judgment in the imminent fight.

_**Perfect. Move up to the next car. I'll set the charges.**_

There was the Dust—the cause of their labor, and what either one of them might die for if they misstep. Blake doesn't pretend to know _why _the White Fang needs so much Dust; she prefers not to think about it. It probably involves mass warfare against the humans, which she finds herself less and less prepared for. But Adam is devoted, heart and nonexistent soul, to the cause (and he trusts her resolve, too, since he asked her to continue on her own). Doubt twinges in Blake's mind, clashing with her fears of leaving, as she glances down at the innocent crystals.

They remind her of the transition between old and new organizations. The only good thing that came from the more violent regime was that Adam trained her how to fight. He was fourteen, almost fifteen, when he became her mentor and subsequent partner; she was a girl of ten. Somehow, he doesn't seem to have changed nearly as much as she has in six years.

_**What about the crew members?**_

Blake knows it's dangerous to let her fear of killing show in her eyes, revealing years' worth of secrecy and lies, but she doesn't care. This is the question whose answer will determine whether she'll leave or stay. Scorning her anxiety seems altogether too likely, choosing the White Fang over her: Blake can hardly imagine Adam Taurus placing her and her comforts over the power and revenge the White Fang could offer. Why does it hurt so much to think that he'll pick the more sensible answer?

She knows why. When Blake was originally introduced to Adam, he was the suavest, most courageous boy she had ever met, and she followed him everywhere, trying to mimic him and be as good a warrior as he. It was for that reason that he had chosen to train her: because he was flattered. She hopes fervently that the part of her that still thinks of him in an irrationally positive light will stay hidden, because Adam is manipulative enough that she won't put it past him to use it against her.

_**What about them?**_

She lets out her breath in what she hopes is a silent exhalation; Adam's short, rhetorical question—so characteristic of her partner—has proven her right. (She _hates _being right.) Physically turning away from her partner's adamant stare, scorching her even from behind the mask, Blake closes her eyes. The tears of parting will come later, she knows, after the adrenaline has worn off and she's safe. Safe from Adam and his sway over her, safe from the White Fang, safe from her own fear. Yes, there will be plenty of time to fall apart.

_**Adam!**_

Has her partner really assumed they can just waltz into the car containing the majority of the Dust and get away scot-free? Staring at the droid descending from the ceiling, Blake can't decide whether she's more angry with Adam because of his infuriating overconfidence and insane gambles (the self-assured bastard) or because he is risking his life. She's less concerned about the fact that she's in danger too, since she sees no shame in escape, whereas Adam would rather stand and fight to the death than run and live to fight another day. That means he is always in much greater danger than she herself: he doesn't know when he's beaten.

(This is the last time she will speak his name aloud for a long, long time.)

_**We need to get out of here.**_

Blake is done trying to fight this thing. Watching carefully as Adam occupies the monster, dodging light-bursts, Blake dashes forward at the first window of opportunity… and is struck to the floor before she can so much as swing her blade. Adam buys her some time while she lies on the ground, winded (though he's hit a moment later too): just when she thinks she's going to die before she can get up and fight, he's suddenly there. Time seems to slow down for a moment as he bends down and picks her up as easily as if she weighs nothing, bringing her to safety. That simple, caring action is almost enough for her to reconsider her decision. Almost.

_**Buy me some time!**_

Adam heeds her words, hesitating instead of drawing Wilt and trying to fight again. He even tries (albeit unsuccessfully) to shield her as the droid blasts them both onto the next car. But now, as though all his prior consideration for her sake is forgotten, he asks her to risk her life to keep it occupied. Blake knows what he's going to do, and that makes it all the worse. Adam possesses a dangerous and conditional semblance, and if he's going to use it—a rare occurrence—then the enemy she's supposed to be occupying has a very good chance of killing her.

_**Are you sure?**_

Blake has no idea why she's giving Adam the opportunity to convince her to stay, or indeed why she bothers asking such a question of a man whom she has never known to change his mind. All she knows is that she desperately wants him to stop being so reckless—to take a look at what he's asking her to do (in this case, 'distract' an apparently invincible robot) and put himself in her shoes for once.

He was so _selfish_. Why did she feel so loyal to this guy?

_**Do it!**_

Blake has no time to hesitate, or think of the sinking feeling of absolute confirmation of his choice. Charging the behemoth, she buys Adam as much time as she can afford as her last gift to him. He deserves nothing less, in her eyes. She backflips to his side once she feels that she has done enough, that she can no longer risk being on the offensive. He's practically glowing with power at that point, ready to strike the final blow.

_**Move!**_

She doesn't need to be told twice. As Adam absorbs the light from one of the droid's attacks, literally glowing a sinister red and laughing smirkingly, Blake takes a running jump onto the next car, following Adam's orders in a way he would never have expected. She turns around hesitantly to watch his semblance at work, loath to leave him without saying farewell. With one slice of Wilt, the droid disintegrates into soot, and Adam sheaths his sword with a sense of proud finality, visible even at a distance.

(Interesting—to think that his last word to her is a command.)

_**Goodbye.**_

She speaks the word softly, _almost_ regretfully, as she looks up to see Adam reaching for her. He drops his hand quickly, though, and Blake could swear he meets her eyes with an invisible, half-challenging stare. Yet he does not speak, or try to join her, or fire Blush and kill her like the traitor she is. As Blake severs the link between the cars with Gambol Shroud, sheathing it a moment later and wondering uneasily whether her now-former partner would leave or stay to watch her go, Adam bows. It's a lingering, somehow painful-looking action, as though straightening up is difficult, and he turns away without looking at her again as soon as he's upright.

Blake stands there, facing his retreating figure (unable to take her eyes off his back), and remembers as if for the first time a memory from mere minutes ago: the touch of Adam's gloves on her thigh as he picked her up and carried her from danger. She wonders, half-apprehensive, whether that touch was born of necessity—or desire. A shudder runs through her at the thought, and she's not sure whether it's one of disgust… or elation. He's just under five years older than her, after all: she's not sure if it's appropriate for a man of twenty-one to want a sixteen-year-old that way. An alarmingly passionate part of her argues brazenly that she doesn't _care_ and she wants him too, and the single shudder is replaced by violent trembling as she silences the voice abruptly.

(She will suppress the thoughts for a long, long time—but that one unwanted realization will lend a new understanding when she reads her romance novels.)

Far in the distance, Adam leaps over a crate and disappears into the car with the Dust, undoubtedly to set the charges as he said he would do. When he's not too busy being conceited, he's very practical, and Blake smiles sadly as she sits on a box, letting out a shaky breath she doesn't realize she's been holding.

No tears have come yet, much to her surprise, but that changes as soon as she thinks about how she might never see Adam again. The possibility simultaneously distresses and exhilarates her. She'll be free, freer than she's ever been in her life—but alone, completely and utterly isolated; a disguised Faunus in a world of humans.

As the train speeds on, towards the rising sun, Blake wonders—closing her eyes in a gesture of both triumph and defeat—whether the cost of leaving the life she's known for years will be too much to bear.

**((Okay, I was definitely wrong when I said in another of my stories that my creativity kick was probably over. It evidently wasn't. This is the result.**

**It's named for the song by Enya, which I recently discovered is pretty much perfect for these two. You should check it out if you ship them.))**


End file.
